Could be. Could be. I think his influence will last far longer, just like lil wayne and his influence helped create young thug and the like....

Good chance of that, I suppose. Fair enough. Thing about Thug is he tries things. He does crazy shit and doesn't give a fuck, and that's cool. I saw a meme video of him rapping, with a caption like "Rappers don't even rap about anything anymore." And, y'know, admittedly the song was about god knows what... pussy, certain kinds of food, happenstance, nonsensical rhymes... but at least it's weird.

I don't personally like him, but I can appreciate that. And I didn't like Wayne for a long time either, until Carter 2 and 3 really, but eventually I saw what people were seeing (just in time for it to disappear forever, apparently).

I just see the trajectory of his career, and in 2015 he was, like, the second coming. In 2016 he had a bunch of mixtapes that faired only sort of well, and an "album" (J3FF3RY) that a lot of critics and fans thought was peak Thug. Then 2017 rolled around, and he dropped a "singing album," and made headlines for like a day... possibly because making a "singing album" has been an uber cliché since the only "singing album" worth listening to came out 9 years ago (you know what I'm talking about.) So, maybe the fact that he was doing something so average it's almost a pre-requirement for next level rap stardom was a turn off, or maybe it just wasn't that good. But I feel the heat around Young Thug dying down significantly.

I wonder who will be the next Wayne/Thug type, to be simultaneously stupid and smart, and to challenge perceptions of street rap.

Kamaiyah is pretty good. I guess. I don't know. I guess I'm kinda sexist about rap, if I'm being honest. I can't think of many female rappers whose music I listen to beyond Lauryn Hill. I should work on that.

I feel it comes from being raised deeply poor. Most poor people in the world have very few things to be proud of, and they are ussually not physical things, like flashy cars, or gold chains. They have to take pride in the achievements open to someone from a deeply impoverished place, such as how mnay girls you bang, how many drugs you can take, hoe you are better than every single person that makes you feel like shit every single day for being a poor ass motherfucker. When you have nothing, all you can espouse is your own bad-assness, whatever that may be.

That is how it started, but of course, there are a lot of rappers in the past 25 years that are only aping/copying/reflecting what they see from the OG's, and so they brag and exaggerate and such, but with them it is about the wit and the intellgience. Rappers always rap about banging strangers and orgies and shit, but just like Rakim would rap about killing you with his microphone, it is mostly a "joke" in a sense.

So by and large, it's just generic subject matter to play with? Like, I think to rhyme "dare it" and "carrot," so I'll stick it in a brag rap?

The subject gets old after awhile, but it is a neat trick when a rapper brags about being the best and the technique proves the point. Example: I think nearly every Big Daddy Kane song is a brag, but, you know, he's really fucking good and I wouldn't really argue with him.

Bragging is ubiquitous in rap. Everyone does it in one way or another. You learn to tolerate the brags that don’t make you feel embarrassed for the artist, and you learn to love the brags that make you laugh or feel genuine or true in some way.

For example:
“Damn ‘Ye, it’d be stupid to dis you
Even your superficial raps are super official”

^ Boom. Funny and accurate. I’m sold.

Compared to one of the most notoriously shitty, shit-balls brags in recent memory:
“Tell my mom I love her if I do not make it
Got so many chains they call me ‘Chaining Tatum’”

Fuck, I feel ashamed for even forgetting to mention her. Easily the best one in the game. Her verse on Complexion was nothing short of greatness.

Oh yeah. I forgot about her too because I haven’t thought about her since I was listening to TPAB all the time, due to the aforementioned semi-sexism of my rap listening habits.

Thanks for reminding me about this. I just hopped over to Apple Music and listened to the available tracks from “Laila’s Wisdom,” and there’s a good one with Busta Rhymes (who I kinda keep forgetting is still alive). Good stuff.

Rhapsody's cool. I like how her music makes white people feel safe, then she throws in the n-word.

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Why does Drake get any respect as a rapper? There's at least two clips of him on youtube completely blowing a freestyle. Everyone can have a bad day, but twenty seconds of "Yo. Alright. Uh-hu. Here we go. Yo. Yeah. Alright" is just pathetic.

Drake is an actor pretending to be a quality rapper. he uses ghostwriters for pretty much everything. I only like a few of his tunes, and usually not because of him, but because of the track itself. His "flow" is straight dookie.

"RZA Reveals Kanye West Is Producing 90s Inspired Music With ASR Machines"

Quote:

RZA and Kanye West have worked together on songs a bunch of times in the past — ‘White Dress’, ‘New Day’, ‘So Appalled’ and more. It was recently revealed that the two had connected in the studio, supposedly to work on Kanye’s upcoming new album.

RZA stopped by Power 106 L.A. recently to promote the upcoming Wu-Tang Clan album, The Saga Continues. At the 26 minute mark, RZA said he wouldn’t like to divulge too many details but revealed that Kanye had two ASR machines in the studio when he visited him. He explained how the Ensoniq ASR machines have a unique way to produce classic 90s Hip-Hop sound. Is ‘Ye cooking up some vintage music?